The present invention relates to a waste liquid collecting method, a liquid injecting apparatus and a cartridge set.
An ink jet type recording apparatus (hereinafter referred to as a printer) has been known as a liquid injecting apparatus for discharging a liquid from a liquid injecting head to a target. A maintenance mechanism is usually provided on a non-printing region in the printer. The maintenance mechanism carries out suction cleaning for sucking a thickened ink and air bubbles from a nozzle in order to prevent the nozzle clogging of a recording head to be a liquid injecting head.
A waste ink sucked from the recording head by the maintenance mechanism is fed to a waste ink tank provided in the printer. Alternatively, the waste ink is fed to an ink cartridge including an ink reservoir portion accommodating an unused ink and a waste ink reservoir portion in some cases (for example, see JP-A-2003-118144). In these cases, the waste ink reservoir portion can also be exchanged simultaneously with the exchange of the cartridge. Therefore, it is possible to produce an advantage that a waste liquid accommodating space can be more reduced than the case in which the waste ink tank is provided in the apparatus.
In the ink cartridge described in the JP-A-2003-118144, however, also in a state in which the waste ink is not sufficiently collected, the arrangement posture of the ink cartridge is changed so that the waste ink comes in contact with an air permeable film in some cases. In general, the air permeability of the air permeable film is not reduced even if the waste ink sticks thereto several times. In the case in which the waste ink often sticks and the sticking waste ink is then dried, however, there is a possibility that the air permeability might be reduced. When the air permeability of the air permeable film is reduced, air sucked from the nozzle opening of the recording head together with the waste ink cannot be discharged from a hole. As a result, a waste ink introducing chamber is filled with the air so that the waste ink cannot be collected any more irrespective of the insufficient collection of the waste ink, and the breakdown of the waste ink introducing chamber, the leakage of the waste ink and the damage of the maintenance mechanism might be caused by a rise in a pressure.
In consideration of the problems, it is an object of the invention to provide a liquid housing and a liquid injecting apparatus which can prevent a waste liquid from leaking out depending on an arrangement posture and can maintain an air permeability. In each cartridge described in the JP-A-2003-118144, the volume of a waste liquid reservoir portion is set to be equal irrespective of a difference in an exchange time depending on a difference between the amounts of consumption of various inks. Accordingly, there is a possibility that a cartridge having an early exchange time might be exchanged in a state in which the waste ink filling rate of the waste ink reservoir portion is low. To the contrary, a cartridge having a late exchange time is attached for a long period. For this reason, the waste ink tends to be collected in a large amount. In order to prevent the leakage of the waste ink, therefore, the capacity of the waste ink reservoir portion is set corresponding to the amount of the waste ink collected by the cartridge having the late exchange time. For this reason, the waste ink reservoir portion and the cartridge tend to be large-sized.
The invention has been made in consideration of the problems and has an object to provide a waste liquid collecting method, a liquid injecting apparatus and a cartridge (liquid housing) set which can reduce the size of the apparatus or the cartridge.
Moreover, it is an object of the invention to provide a waste liquid collecting method, a liquid injecting apparatus and a cartridge (liquid housing) set which can efficiently store a waste liquid in a plurality of liquid housings.